The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1887-06-09

letters, What morning that was when you
left home Father and mother crying, sis,
ters crying, You smiling outside but crying
inside Everybody nervous and excited
Boys of the blue and gray Whether you
started from the banks of the Hudson, or
the Savannah, or the Androscbggn, don't
you remember the, scenes at the front door,
1T the fail car window, OH the steamboat
landing, The hu2za could not drown out the
suppressed sadness, Don't you remember
those charges to write home often and take
care of yourself, be good boys, and the good
bye kiss which they thought and you thought
might be forever. Then the inconsistencies as
you faced the river bank ON a starlight night
On picket duty and the sly tears which you
wiped on when you heard group 1T the
camp fire singing the plantation song about
the old folks at home. The dim
ner of hard tack on Thanksgiving
day and the Christmas without any presents,
and the long nights in the hospital so differ
ent from the sickness when you were at home
with mother and sister at the bedside, and
the clock In the hall giving the exact moment
Tor tie medicine, and that forced, march
when your legs ache1, and your head ached,
and your wounds ached, and, more than all,
your heart ached Homesicliness that had in
it a suifocaton and pang worse than death,
You never got hardened did the guardsman
in the Crimean war, who heartlessly wrote
home to his mother;
81 do not want to see any more crying let.
ters come TO the Crimea from you, Those
have received put into my rifle after load
ing it and l have fred them at the Russians,
because you appear to have strong dislike
of them If you have seen as many killed as
/ have you would not have as many weak
ideas as you now have
You never felt like that. When soldiers
knapsack was found after his death in our
NOR NSn VIC ly n
package containing Bible, few photo
graphs and letters from home, On the other
hand tens of thousands of homes waited for
news. Parents saying: Twenty Thousand
killed! | wonder if our boy was among
them.n Painting dead away in postoffices
and telegraph stations Both the ears OF
God filed with the sobs and agonies of kim
dred waiting for news or dropping under
the announcement of bad news Speak,
swamps of Chickahominy and midnight Ia
goons and fire-rafts of the Mississippi, and
gunboats before Vicksburg, and woods of
Antietanl, and tell to all the mountains and
villages and rivers and lakes of North and
South jeremiads of war times that have
never been syllabled.
Beside that domestic perturbation and
homesickness of those days put the sweet
domesticity of to-day. The only camp fire
you now ever sit at is the one kindled in stove
or furnace or hearth. Instead of half ration
of salt pork, a repast luxuriant because
partaken of by loving family circles in secret
letters were for, the letters you, the
young soldier, took so long in your
tent to write and that you were SO
particular to put in the mail without anyone
seeing you lest you be teazed by your COM
rades. God spared you to get back. Though
the old people have gone You have home of
yonr own construction, and you often contrast
fbnSa awful absapras of tilial and hrOthprlV
and loverly heartbreaks, with your pres
ent residence, which is the dearest place you
will find this side of heaven the place where
your children were born and the place where
you want to die. To write the figures 1862
set up four crystals of tears To write the
figures 1887 stand UP four members of your
household, figures of rosy cheeks and f1axen
hair, if l can get them to stand still long
enough
Living soldiers of the North andSouth, take
new and special ordination at this season of
the year to garland the sepulchres of your
fallen comrades Nothing is too good for
their memories Turn all the private tombs
and the national cemeteries into gardens. Ye
dead of Malvern HILL ard Cold Harbor, and
Murfreesboro, and Manassas Junction, and
Cumberland Gap, and field and hospital re-
ceive these floral offerings of the living sol
diery.
But they shall come again, all the dead
troops. We sometimes talk about earthly
military reviews, such as took place in Paris,
in the time of Marshal Ney, in London, in
the time of Wellington, and in our own land !;
but what tame things compared with the
final review, when all the armies of the ages
shall pass for divine and angelic inspection.
st. John says the armies of heaven ride on
white horses, and l don't know but
some of the old cavalry horses of
earthly battle that were wounded and worn
l,.,-
would be only fair that, raised up and en-
nobled, they would be resurrected for the
grand review of the Judgment Day. 1t
1t would not take any more power to recon-
struct their bodies than to reconstruct ours,
and l should be very glad to see them among
the white horses of Apocalyptic vision. Hank
to the trumpet blast, the reveile of
the last Judgment. They come up. All the
armies of all lands and all centuries, on which
| ever side they fought, whether for freedom
or despotism, for the right or the wrong
They come They come Darius and Cyrus
and Sennacherib, and Joshua and David,
leading forth the armies of Scriptural
times. Hannibal and Hamlcar leading
forth the armies of the Carthaginians.
Victor Emanuel and Garibaldi leading on the
armies of the Italians. Tamerlane and
Ghengis Khan followed by the armies of Asia
| Gustavus Adolphus, and Ptolemy Philopater,
and Xerxes, and Alexander, and Semiramis,
and Washington leading battalion after bat
talon The dead American armies of 1T16
and 1872, and one million of Northern and
Southern dead in our civil war. They come
up. They pass on in review. The six million
| fallen in Napoleonic battle, the twelve million
Germans fallen in the thirty years war, the
fifteen million fallen in the war under Sesos-
iris the twenty million fallen in the wars of
Justinian, the twenty-five million fallen i'll
Jewish wars, the eighty million fallen i'll the
crusades, the $50 million fallen in the wars
with Saracens and Turks. The thirty-tive
billion men estimated to have fallen in battle,
enough according to one statistician if they
stood four abreast, to reach clear around the
| earth 442 times.
But we shall have time to see them pass in
review before the throne of Judgment the
cavalry-men the artillery-men. the spear
men, the infantry, the sharp shooters, the
gunners, the sappers, the miners, the archers,
the skirmishers, men of all colors, Of all epau,
let's, of all standards, of all weaponry, of all
countries. Let the earth be especially bal
anced to bear their tread, Forward For
ward Let the orchestra of the heavenly
galleries play the grand mBrch, joined
by all the fifers, drummers and mil
itary bands that ever sounded victory OF
defeat at Eylau or Borodino, Marathon OF
Thermopyla, Bunker Hill or Yorktown, Sol
ferino or Balaclava, Sedan or Gettysburg
from the time when Joshua halted astronomy
above Gibeon and Ajalon till the last man
surrendered to Garnet Wolseley at Tel-el-
Kebir. Nations, companies, battalions,. ages,
centuries and the universe! Forward in the
grand review of the Judgment Forward
Gracious and eternal God! On that day
may it be found that we We're all
marching in the right regiment, and that we
carried the right standard, and that we
fought under the right commander, all
heaven, some on Amethystine battlement and
others standing in the shining gates, some on
pearly shore and others on the turreted
heights giving us the resounding, million
voiced cheer "More than conquerors. u
Blessed be the Lord God of Israel from ever
lasting to everlasting, and let the whole earth
be filled with His glory. Amen and Amen.